Pekin prepares for potential school shootings

Friday

PEKIN — A voice came over the intercom at Pekin Community High School shortly before 9 a.m. on Tuesday. “Teachers, protect your dragons. Remember, this is a drill.”

Seconds later, the first shot rang out.

The blank round, fired from a Pekin police sergeant's shotgun, is a simulation of an ever-more-prevalent occurrence.

The school reached reached what officials are calling the logical end-point of a roughly decade long buildup of the school’s lockdown drills. This drill was the first with shots were fired while students were in the building.

Officers walked throughout different parts of the building, firing blanks. The idea was to cover as much ground as possible, ensuring all in the building would be exposed to the sound of gunfire.

Sgt. Rick Von Rohr has done lockdown drills for about 15 years. In the early days, they were as simple as ensuring students were out of sight and classroom doors locked. The drills have taken on new realism in the past five years as he and other officers have taken to firing blanks inside the schools while the faculty was inside.

The decision to include students was made by school faculty, according to Von Rohr. District 303 Superintendent Danielle Owens said the decision to expose students to the sounds of gunfire was made, in part because of the legitimate safety concerns surrounding schools, but also because she thinks high school students are ready. Owens believes if her students, like others across the country, are aware of the reality they’re facing, she and her teachers need to meet them on their level.

“I think kids these days grow up in a generation that we didn’t,” she said. “To think that they don’t come to school thinking about something that could happen everyday … that’s not reality.”

In an ongoing study, The Washington Post has found that 228,000 students have experienced gun violence at 234 schools across the country. In the first eight-plus months of 2019, there have been nine school shootings which resulted in one death and 12 injuries. Across the nine schools, 7,080 students were present at the time. There have been a total of 239 school shootings in America since the Columbine shooting in April 1999.

“As time has gone on and, unfortunately, as things continue to happen across the United States, I think there’s more of a willingness on all of our parts to be more transparent about what we’re doing,” said Owens.

EFFECT ON STUDENTS

Does the sound of gunshots — blanks or otherwise — have an effect on students' mental health. It's a reasonable thing to ask.

Owens said that topic was discussed internally before deciding to move forward with the drill. Those involved in the planning process felt the positives outweighed the negatives, as uncomfortable as it may be for everyone. The drill was scheduled for 9 a.m. so students could speak to mental health professionals during the day if needed. There was also a support dog in the building.

Few students met with counselors on the day of the drill, and there were reported no additional visits by Thursday afternoon, said Assistant Principal Joel Schmieg. He added school faculty will continue to monitor the environment as it pertains to the drill in the near future, and make adjustments to future drills accordingly.

Both Schmieg and Owens credit this reaction — or non-reaction — from the majority of students back to the idea that they already see gun violence as a real threat, but that doesn’t mean the drill didn’t have an impact.

In addition to her role as superintendent, Owens is also a parent of a student who took part in the drill.

The drill, she said, resulted in a dinner table conversation about the experience for her daughter. Owens said what was relayed to her is that, as expected, her daughter felt the drill was disconcerting, but that her peers took it seriously. The goal was largely achieved, Owens believes, in that it gave students and staff a greater awareness of what a firearm would sound like inside the building and an opportunity to test new procedures, including a new rostering app called CrisisGo.

Still, the superintendent is cautious to get too excited. School administrators find themselves in a no-win situation; a world in which they can achieve the goal of preparing students, kids, for the event that an armed intruder could enter their building and attempt to kill them. She hopes to never cross the line of desensitization, which means keeping the messaging to a minimum.

“We’re not here to desensitize kids,” Owens said.

OTHER CLASSROOM EFFECTS

Students aren’t the only ones Owens has in mind when it comes to a larger burden to bear as teachers will be asked to know how to use one of the tourniquet that will be in each classroom. To that end, last week, the educators were given a tourniquet-training course.

Whether it be learning how to use the new crisis management app or wrangling with the idea they may have to apply a tourniquet to a wounded student, Owens empathizes with what is now being asked of her teachers.

“It’s impactful, it’s scary. Nobody wants to sit on the first day of school to get trained on a crisis app, that wasn’t what we got into (education) for,” said Owens.

Prior to the tourniquet training, teachers were given the opportunity to ask questions of law enforcement and administration about the drill, but Owens said the response, for the most part, was on the positive side.

“I think people probably understand, just like all of us do, why we’re doing it,” said Owens. “But it doesn’t make it any more comfortable.”

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